THERE is a special message from heaven for this generation. It is the divine provision for this hour,—the divine provision4to expose the snares of Satan which have been laid for this time,—the divine provision to save men and women from the sins of this time. We speak of it as the third angel's message. We are here because of it. Had it not been for such a message as this, there would have been no people known as Seventh-day Adventists. This people and this work owe their existence to the simple fact that for the people of this generation there is a special message from heaven.
In this day when the scripture is being fulfilled which says, 'In the last days perilous times shall come;' in this day when iniquity abounds, and the love of many is waxing cold; in this day when men are being spoiled 'through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ;' in this day when a false science is evolving and is presenting a conception of God which is in itself mystical, and is really atheistical; in this day when those who are set for the defense of the gospel, are, many of them, betraying their trust, and are denying the inspiration of the Scriptures as the Word of God, are denying the divinity of Christ, and are denying the need and efficacy of the atonement,—in this day, and for this day, there is a special message from heaven.
This message takes up the words of Isaiah the prophet, and says to all the world: 'All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. . . . Behold your God! Behold, the Lord God will come.' It takes up the setting in which these words were given to the world by John the Baptist in his message when he said, fitting the message to the hour and to the time, 'Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!' It takes up both of these messages, and gives to them the setting that belongs to them by the prophecy, and says, 'Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come; and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of water.'
This is a special message from heaven to the world for this time, and this message is to expose and to set right the wrong teaching of this time. This message is to set forth the Word of God as being inspired of God, and 'profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.'
This message is to set forth Jesus Christ as the divine Son of God, God manifest in the flesh, Emmanuel, 'God with us.' And this message also is to set us right, and to set right all who will hear it, concerning the atonement for sin, that which is now being largely set at naught, in making every man his own savior by evolving himself from a state of sin into a state of righteousness. This special message from heaven is to take hold of every deception, and set it right before the world in the proclamation of God's gospel, as God would have it proclaimed in this day. This is the special message from heaven for the people of this generation.
Note for a moment the call for such a message. It is not necessary for us to deal with a theory of the time, or to attempt to fit any theory to our theory of the time. We must be impressed now with the meaning of the time. Do we not see, and do we not feel, the intensity of the time? Do we not realize in our own experience the fact of the intensity, the strain, the pressure of this hour? Is not this the fulfilment of that word which has been spoken to us that there is a special power rising from beneath, and taking hold of every agency? And is there not need that there should be fulfilled this further word, that there should come also a special power from heaven that should be revealed in God's people, in his work for this time? In this closing period of the great controversy, are we to expect anything else than that, however great the power may be that is exerted against God's truth, there shall be a greater power to meet it? Is this not in accordance with the Word of God?
It is an easy matter for us who are here to think back five, ten, fifteen, twenty, and some of us twenty-five, thirty, forty, and it may be fifty years. Suppose fifty years, or forty years, or thirty years ago we had suddenly been transplanted from that day and time, and from the experiences of that hour, to the experiences of to-day, would it not have been with a shock? The change has come by degrees in such a way that we ourselves have become more or less hardened to it; we ourselves hardly appreciate the changes that have come in the world in our generation. One who must read the daily record that is being made now is impressed with the fact that there is a special revelation of satanic agency in the world now. Is it not true that to-day the daily record contains unusual crimes, far different from what occurred twenty or thirty years ago, and with but little provocation? Does it not show clearly that there is a power that is taking possession of men and women, and that is beginning to rule them almost against their will?
Now where is the power, and where is the channel through which that power will be revealed, that will meet this increasing power of Satan, and will give victory to men and women in this generation,—victory in their own lives, and a final glorious victory to the church? Of course that is power of God; but the ordained means for the revelation of that power in this generation, for the people of this time, is this special message from heaven that we call the third angel's message.
This message has called us out. We have professed before the world to believe that there was such a message, and that this is the message, and that this is the people, and that this is the movement that is to close the gospel work. These considerations bring a responsibility upon every one who has taken that position, that he himself should act well his part in the revelation of that truth, in the revelation of that saving grace and power, that this message, which is the only hope of this generation, shall spread with great rapidity throughout the world, and save the people of this generation just so far as they will receive it. Whether we are in the ministry technically or not, whether we occupy any special place or position in this work or not, the fact that this message has found us, makes us debtors to those whom this message has not found; the fact that we have received a light which we prize as being special light for this generation makes us debtors to give that light to others.
But let us inquire more specifically what it is that distinguishes this special message from other preaching of the gospel in this generation. What message can we give, and in what way can we give that message, that we shall have something to declare to the world that no other people have to declare? and how can we know whether we ourselves are holding fast to the message, or whether we are being swerved from it?
Note one or two things first: the keynote of the message is the first thing to find, and the keynote of this message is that the return of Christ to our world will not be long delayed. In a certain sense, the whole gospel is the gospel of the advent message; but when we come to this generation, when we have passed the fulfilment of certain time prophecies, and other prophecies have their application to the world, then we may say that the coming of Christ the second time to our world will not be long delayed; and that is the keynote of the message, that is the fundamental tone of the message.
There are others who teach the advent of Christ, there are others who teach the seventh-day Sabbath, there are others who teach conditional immortality. There are various phases of this truth that enter in what we term the special message for this time, which you will hear spoken of in other pulpits, but what is the distinguishing feature of this special message which has called out this people, and which is to distinguish the message that this people is to give to the world, from any other teaching of the gospel in this generation? It is important to make this inquiry for our own sakes. It5is important to make this inquiry as a basis for the correct teaching of this message in this generation.
We need not expect that this message will be allowed to do its work without a supreme effort to turn it aside. This message being what we believe it to be, it is to be expected that an effort will be made to turn it aside from its purpose, to blind the minds of those who are called out to give this message, and to prevent it from accomplishing its work in this generation. And I hardly need to add the other word which you have thought of already—that it has been done.
This denomination ought to have one voice, this message to the world ought to be as the message of one man, not in uniformity of expression, not necessarily in uniformity in every shade of view of Bible truth; but in the most blessed unity in the presentation of the whole message, which ought to grow out of the very nature of the message, and our personal experience with the message.
Now again let us ask what is to distinguish the preaching of this message from any other preaching of the gospel for this generation. It is quite true that the question of the Sabbath is to stand out in clearness and with emphasis as a very marked feature in the giving of this message; and I might add more than that even, I might say truthfully that there can be no other such preaching of the seventh-day Sabbath as should be taught in this message; even though there be others who do teach the obligation to observe the seventh-day Sabbath, there should be a teaching of that truth from the standpoint of this message which will mark it as distinct from any other teaching apart from this message.
But there is something which involves the Sabbath question, which does not vitiate anything we have said about the prominence of that issue in this message, or its peculiar character in this message; there is something that lays the foundation for all this special and specific message to the world; and that is bound up in that great truth that we speak of familiarly as the sanctuary question.
Recall the history of this people; those who are familiar with the early days know that it was the teaching of the truths revealed through the sanctuary and its services which called out this people, the Seventh-day Adventists, and those who are familiar with the instruction which came at that time know that the spirit of prophecy said that 'such subjects as the sanctuary, in connection with the twenty-three hundred days, the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus, are perfectly calculated to explain the past advent movement, show what our present position is, establish the faith of the doubting, and give certainty to the glorious future.' These I have frequently seen were the principal subjects on which the messengers should dwell.' That instruction applies just as clearly to-day as then.
Out of that teaching of the sanctuary question in the gospel sense will come the special mold and setting to this message. That message of Revelation 14, in the threefold presentation of it, is built upon the sanctuary question as its foundation. This message which comes in the closing generation is not something apart from, and not fitting into, all the teaching of the gospel in the past. It is not a new gospel, it is simply the climax of all the teaching of the gospel since the first promise was made to our parents in the garden of Eden. It is the keystone for this six-thousand years of gospel teaching, and in it will be found principles that involve every principle of the gospel reaching back to Eden. And this teaching, this heaven-sent message for the people of this generation, is not to take the place of any truth in the past. It is not to present any new plan of God for the salvation of this generation; but it is to gather up all the truths of all past generations, it is to put them into the setting in which truth must be proclaimed in this generation, in order to meet the situation which God foresaw long before we knew anything about it; and it must be presented from that standpoint, and in that setting, in order that the same gospel truth of salvation through faith in the merits of Christ our Saviour may have a standing ground and do its work in this generation. And this setting is found in the sanctuary and its services.